Thermodynamics of a magnetically expanding plasma with isothermally behaving confined electrons

Abstract

Thermodynamics of a magnetically expanding plasma (magnetic nozzle (MN)) has been investigated considering the existence of confined electrons bouncing back and forth inside a potential well formed by a combination of external magnetic field and self-generating ambipolar electrostatic potential. The properties of confined electrons are distinguished from that of the adiabatically expanding electrons with gamma(e) approximate to 5/3 by the separate measurement of each species using a double-sided planar Langmuir probe. Relationship between the electron pressure versus electron density averaged over electron energy probability functions (eepfs) clearly reveals that the confined electrons in MN have a nearly isothermal characteristic. Existence of isothermally behaving confined electrons together with adiabatically expanding electrons separates the MN system into two regions with different thermodynamic properties; one is a nearly adiabatic region located near the nozzle throat and the other is nearly isothermal region located far from the nozzle. A transition of electron thermodynamic property along a distance from the nozzle throat can be explained with conservation of magnetic moment of electrons bounced back by ambipolar electrostatic potential. Coexistence of the nearly adiabatic electrons with Maxwellian eepf and the nearly isothermal electrons with high energy-depleted eepf makes the overall eepf shape low energy-populated eepf, indicating a need for careful analysis on the measured eepfs near the nozzle throat. In spite of significant contribution of confined electrons to eepf and overall electron thermodynamics, it is found that the confined electrons behaving isothermally do not contribute to the generation of ambipolar electrostatic potential which is important for ion acceleration in MN. The present study suggests that ion acceleration should not be directly inferred from the value of polytropic exponent gamma(e) because thermodynamic property of a MN is influenced by isothermally behaving confined electrons as well as adiabatically expanding electrons.